The Calm Tempest
by zippymom97
Summary: Dirk runs a tattoo parlour but he just fired karkat, his piercer, and is trying to hire a new one. A young man around his age with glasses, green eyes and brown hair comes in to apply for the job. M/M, will be sex scenes eventually. future cottoncandy, but basically just read it over at ao3 bc thats where i do most of my stuff.
1. Chapter 1

Stretching with a yawn as he woke up, Dirk reached over to shut off his alarm clock and grab his sunglasses. He went to the bathroom and showered, washing his tattooed skin and shampooing his blonde hair with black streaks. He sighed as he stepped out and towelled off, rubbing his hair dry before wiping down his toned, muscular body. Today would be another day at the tattoo parlour. Tedious as it may be, he loved his business and his job.

He would have to look into hiring a new piercer today. He had had a fight with his old one, Karkat. He always had to pick fight over the smallest things and it was eventually just too much for Dirk to handle so he fired him and told him to never come back, to which he flipped him the bird, told him to fuck himself, and told him where he could stick his tattoo gun before storming out of the shop. Dirk sighed and ran a hand through his still-damp hair, walking out of the steamy bathroom to go get dressed for the inevitably long day ahead.

Once dressed, he grabbed the keys and headed downstairs to open up his tattoo and piercing shop, The Calm Tempest. He unlocked the shop, turned on the lights with a satisfied sigh, made sure all the needles and kits were clean and in order, and flipped around the open sign before heading to his desk to pull out a piece of paper saying that they would be temporarily unable to offer piercings until they could hire a new one, and another to say 'PIERCER WANTED'. He wrote the signs in black sharpie and taped them up to the door, returning to his desk at the back of the room.

He started looking online for piercers and spent a few hours on this, to not much luck. He sighed and removed his glasses, rubbing his face heavily with this hands, sighing at his luck. He had no choice but to fire Karkat, it was just impossible to work with him any longer. He sighed again, resting his face on his cheeks, looking glumly at his desktop. Just then, the bell on the door jingled and a young man about the same age as Dirk walked in, out of breath, leaning against the door with a flushed face and hands on his knees, holding a few sheets of papers in one hand.

He looked up over the rim of his glasses to make eye contact with Dirk and hold up a finger until he could catch his breath better. Once he had, he came over to the desk, leaning on it, still panting a fair bit. The young brunette passed the papers to him on the desk. It was a resume.

"Hi…I saw your… sign on the door… and I wanted… to apply here." The man panted out.

Dirk nodded and indicated for him to sit down because he looked like he definitely needed it. He picked up the papers and looked them over.

Jake English, 21, Male, Tattoo and Piercing Artist.

Hm. Nice, does he have any experience? Dirk thought as his eyes skimmed further down the page. He had worked at a few, in a bunch of different locations. Does he travel a lot? As he wondered this, he got AR to run a background check on Jake to double check that he wasn't a pedophile or serial killer or anything major. As AR did that, Dirk looked up at Jake, who was now fidgeting nervously in his seat. He noticed Dirk looking up at him and quickly glanced up to meet his gaze, looking expectant and eager.

"So, do you have any photos of some of your work?" Dirk said, looking back down at the papers again, checking out his qualifications.

"Ah- oh! Yes, they're on my phone, just give me a second to scroll back far enough to find it."

"Yeah, sure, go for it." Just then, AR got back with the background check, he was all clear. Now just to see some of his work and he'd be in. Well, he would be in no matter what, he was qualified to do piercings and body modifications which was good enough. Jake pulled up an image on his phone of a very elaborate and detailed grim reaper with his hands folded across his chest, then he swiped to the side to show a skull with snakes running through it, then to a flaming nymph, then to a really hot picture of him shirtless and pulling down the waistband of his shorts. Dirk's eyes widened as he struggled to keep his composure, a bit of a flush rising to his cheeks a he fought a boner. Jake quickly realized that wasn't the right picture and stammered and flicked to the next one which was of a darkening and dying rose. He was beet red and still blathering on.

"Jake, its fine. It's a bare chest, nothing I haven't seen before. I see it all the time here. I really like your tats by the way. Oh and you're hired."

"But still an employer shouldn't se- wait seriously?"

"Yeah, you're qualified, your work is fucking sick as hell, and you can pierce. And you don't have a criminal record. That's all that matters. You can go take those signs off the window now as your first job."

Jake beamed, and damn was he cute when he smiled. "Sure thing, boss!" he said happily, before his face fell, realizing something, "Wait, you didn't even type anything on your computer, how do you know I don't have a criminal record, mister..?"

"Strider, Dirk Strider, and that's for me to know and for you to possibly find out later. After all, I am a man of mystery. Nevertheless, I am glad to have you here."

He held his hand out as a greeting to his new employee and co-worker, smiling at him warmly. They shook and Dirk tasked Jake in taking down the sign while Dirk got out the paperwork for new employees. Jake came back and Dirk handed him the paperwork and a pen, and he sat down and filled it out. As he wrote, Dirk studied him.

Jake had a lovely profile and he would make a great drawing subject. Dirk's mind wandered to that one photo Jake had accidentally shown him, and his mind started filling in the blanks, and before his train of thought could go any further, Jake was handing the papers back with a smile.

"Thanks," He took them and filled them away. "I have a client coming in this morning, and people don't usually drop in this early so you can just chill at the front desk and pretend like you know what you're doing while I tattoo."

"Ok, sounds good. Does this computer have solitaire?"

Dirk chuckled and nodded, surprised at the question.

In the time before the expected arrival of said client, Dirk was just starting the explaination of the Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff tattoo he had on his shoulder when he heard a jingle at the front door and looked up. A well-dressed woman crossed the threshold to the counter elegantly.

"Appointment for Kanaya Maryam?"

"Hmmm… let's see… ah, there you are. Ten minutes ahead of schedule, I see. I admire people with punctuality." Dirk made a show of pretending to look it up, as I anyone else would be here this early. He lead her to one of the back rooms, allowing her to get seated and comfortable while he went to get the necessary supplies.

"Thank you, I quite enjoy people like that too." She said, putting her purse down under her chair, smiling at him.

"I'll be right back with the stencil and ink, if you could be ready for me in about 3-5 minutes….?"

"I shall." She nodded and waited until he left to stand up and remove her underwear and pull up her dress enough so that he would have access to her lower buttock and upper thigh.

Dirk returned with the stencil and let it hover above her thigh. "Here?" She nodded and he placed the stencil down on her thigh, smoothing it out so that all of the image was transferred, and lifted the peel.

He grabbed a mirror and lifted it so she could see the stencil in the reflection. "Still want it? Last chance to back out."

"I'm positive."

"Just making sure." Dirk said with a chuckle as he put the mirror down and grabbed the black ink to get the outline started and a cloth to wipe up the blood.

He positioned himself on the chair by her thigh, shaking the ink bottle before attaching it to the needle. He turned on the needle and started tattooing, hearing her hiss in pain only once out of shock when he first started, and after that she didn't make a sound. Tough, elegant, polite, and punctual. She is one hell of a woman.

He finally finished the linework that covered the transfer, then he went over to his station to wash his needle and switch to the shading needles he used for colouring. He put the red ink in the machine and sat back down, letting Kanaya know when he was about to start.

A few hours later, he stood up, stretching his back as he looked at the finished product. "Dammmn, I did good. You mind if I take a picture of this for my portfolio?" he asked her as he went to go get the aftercare kit and wash.

"No not at all. Could I see the photo when you've taken it?"

"Of course, madam, that is exactly what I was intending to do." He exchanged a smile with her and cleaned up the tattoo really well and took his phone out and snapped a photo of the red, long stemmed rose going up her thigh. He took a few and once he had one that looked good, he came around to show her how it looked.

She gasped in awe, her eyes lighting up. "Oh, Dirk… it looks gorgeous… thank you so much."

"Just doing my job. Hang on, don't go anywhere yet, I've still got to put the ointment on and cover it."

As he did that, Jake manned the desk, hoping to god that no-one would come in because Dirk hadn't yet told him what exactly to do to man the front desk. Luckily, no one came in, and Dirk emerged from a back room with a very pretty and sophisticated-looking woman in a flowy dress. He was giving her the typical after-tattoo spiel, and he jumped as he heard a woman speak behind him that he hadn't heard approach.

"Pretty fancy for just going to get a tattoo, Kanaya." A blonde woman said to the one that just emerged from the back room. "Do I get to see it?"

"It's already wrapped but I took a picture of it for my portfolio that I can show you."

"Yes please, that would be greatly appreciated."

He passed her the phone and handed Kanaya the aftercare kit and rang her through the till. The blonde "awwwwwwwe"d and passed the phone back to Dirk. "That's almost as sweet as if you had my name tattooed on you."

"Essentially. However, in the event that we do not work out at least it looks beautiful and I won't need to have it removed." The two linked arms and started heading out the door.

"That's true…" Their conversation faded as they walked out of earshot.

A somewhat uncomfortable silence descended on the two males. Jake was the one who decided to speak first.

"So, as you were saying, about that tattoo…"

After the day was done and they closed shop, Dirk noticed that Jake started walking home, and on impulse, decided to give him a ride.

"Hey, why don't I give you a lift home?" The blonde asked, his keys in hand.

"Oh, I doubt that's really necessary..."

"Come on, I saw your address on your resume; you're practically across town."

Jake sighed and nodded as Dirk unlocked his car. They hopped in and buckled up.

"Speaking of, what brought you there anyway?"

"I actually saw your add online about the store opening a few months back and I've been saving up for a design, but I got booted from my old job and I wanted to at least get the details on the place so I could know how good you were, etc. Anyway, I saw your sign and I ran home to print off a resume before coming back."

Dirk let out a small chuckle. "I admire the commitment and work ethic. So, how'd you like your first day?"

"Exhilarating! There were so many people and they were very friendly for the most part!"

Dirk nodded, "My clients are pretty nice over-all."

There was another silence. After a moment Dirk turned to Jake "Where did you learn to shade like that by the way?"

Jake shrugged, "I suppose I was just pretty good at pencil shading, and after a little practice I got good at tattoo shading as well."

Dirk turned back to face the road; "I'll have to watch and see how you do it sometime, then."

Jake nodded in agreement and let the silence return.

They had arrived at his house so he thanked Dirk graciously for the ride and the job, asking what time he should be there tomorrow before saying goodbye.

As Dirk pulled away from the curb, Jake ran his hands through his hair and sighed; he had a feeling he was really going to like working there.

Jake was on the phone with Jane, as usual. The two were pretty close and he called her often to update her on life and vent his feelings. Jane usually liked these calls and little chats. Except if they went past the hour and a half mark. Which it often did.

This one was currently overstaying its welcome. Jane was waiting for her cake to finish baking but she really had to go to the bathroom and wanted to hang up so she could do so.

Jake was currently going on about his new job at the tattoo parlour he was going to work at, his hot new boss who he accidentally showed a semi-NSFW photo to, and how his boss honestly seemed to like it, and how that had hope for his love life, yadda yadda yadda...

Jake went on for a while about this, and Jane's patience was wearing thin, again. This went unnoticed to Jake, AGAIN. But of course, she was far too nice of a person to really do anything about it so she chose to excuse herself when the cake timer went off.

They hung up and she immediately went to the bathroom, sighing in relief as she washed her hands.

She grabbed the cake out of the oven and set the timer to let it cool before putting the icing on it, taking a well-needed nap in the meantime.


	2. Chapter 2

Dirk woke up at his usual time, same as always, made himself breakfast and coffee, got dressed and went downstairs to open up shop. He was watching Stevens Universe last night on a reccomendation from his friend Roxy, and he ended up really liking it and then marathoning it. He scrubbed his face and turned on the light, thankful that his shades protected him partially from the intensity of the glare.

He booted up the computer and went around and freshly sanitized all the tables, chairs, and equipment. Once that was done, Dirk sat down at his desk and stared blankly and tiredly at his computer screen, his desktop already up and ready to go. Dirk didn't notice this, his head slouched on a hand, his mouth partially open in a dumbfounded stare at the monitor, his eyes drooping ever lower, lower, lower. His consciousness slipping, slipping, gone. Luckily for him his elbow was propped well enough that when the muscles in his arm went limp, his head didn't hit the desk.

What felt like only moments later there was a loud rapping at the door, and Dirk bolted awake, falling out of his seat and onto the floor; an action that did not go unnoticed to the patron that had knocked. His arm was wet with drool and there was a copious puddle of the substance on the desk where he had fallen asleep. He mumbled a profanity or two as he quickly wiped his hand on his jeans and wiped the rest of his arm off with his shirt. Still cursing under his breath, Dirk went to answer the door and face whatever ridicule that might be launched at him.

"Good morning, dear chap!" Jake chirped happily as soon as the door was opened to him. He stepped inside and hung his coat up on the rack just inside the door.

"Thedoorwasunlockedyanno" was the only reply his greeting garnered from the groggy Strider, who meandered over to lay down on one of the tattoo chairs.

"Oh, well then. I'm not quite positive it was. Not quite awake yet, are we?" Jake asked, still way to friggan chipper for Dirk's liking, as he sat down on the stool alongside the chair Dirk was laying on.

"Not even fucking close" The blonde grunted and rolled into a more comfortable position, away from the sunlight. "Wake me up if there's a customer. Do whatever the fuck you want in the meantime. There's games on the computer and shit. Just don't go rooting through folders and crap, mmkay?"

"Cross my heart boss!" Jake replied, hopping up from the stool as he made his way over to the computer. He thought he heard Dirk mumble something along the lines of "Don't call me that" but the brunette couldn't be certain.

Jake scanned the icons on the desktop. There were several that he recognized. There was Mozzarella Flamefox as the main web browser, an application labelled PESTERCHUM in all caps, several folders that had no names, only numbers, another application called Complete Bullshit, a recycle bin, a Macrosoft Office folder, what was probably a virus cleaning software, and something called Note++.

Jake moved the mouse over the start menu and went to games. He stuck with a good old fashioned game of solitaire and alternated between that and checking for customers. He kept doing this for a while, noticing people come up to the front of the shop, stop, look in at them, but not enter. It took Jake a fair bit to realize that Dirk had forgotten to plug in the OPEN sign. Jake soon remedied that and went back to his solitaire until he heard the bell chime and someone barged in.

Jake nudged Dirk awake and went to go talk to the man that walked in. "Do you have an appointment or are you a drop-in?"

"WHAT DOES IT MATTER TO YOU?! WHO EVEN ARE YOU?! IS THIS MY REPLACEMENT?! WITH HOW MUCH OF A SHITHOLE THIS PLACE IS, I'M SURPRISED YOU FOUND SOMEONE THIS FAST."

Dirk rose to his feet and walked over to the short, angry man, knowing already who it was without having even to open his eyes. "Karkat, how nice of you to visit. Still pleasant as ever, I see."

"CUT THE SHIT, DIRK, I CAME BACK FOR MY STUFF."

"Then stop being an asshole and just go fucking grab it!"

"DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO." Karkat quipped angrily as he stormed out of the room to go fetch whatever it was he forgot.

Dirk sighed exhaustedly and sat down on the chair he had been laying on, running a hand over his face then through his hair, rolling his eyes. He could tell that Jake was about to ask, or at least that he wanted to. He didn't really care enough at the moment to beat him to the punch and answer before he could ask, so he waited in silence until he did. Turns out it was longer than Dirk had originally thought. Jake had waited until Karkat left (not without slinging a few more insults at Dirk) to ask.

"Erm…. Sooo…. What exactly just happened?"

"You have just had the displeasure of meeting my ex-co-worker, Karkat. He was the piercer I fired. As you can clearly see why."

Jake chuckled nervously, "Aha, yes, he seems like…quite the fellow."

"Well, that's one way to put it, sure. Sorry you had to deal with that."

"Oh, no, it's quite alright." Jake replied, and Dirk merely nodded, and they sat in somewhat uncomfortable silence as Dirk grabbed a sketchbook and started doodling.

At a lack of what to do, Jake went back to the computer and resumed his game of solitaire. They continued on like this for at least 15 minutes.

"He is honestly such a douche though! He just barges in here like he fucking owns the place and bitches at you even though you haven't even met him. He just…pisses me off so much. He is like that constantly, and that is the exact reason why I fired him. He is absolutely insufferable."

"Well, I'm sure if you started out on his good side and took the time to get to know him, he wouldn't be all that bad."

"Yeah, that's what I thought too, until he started going all 'I'm-always-right-and-here's-why-you-can-suck-my-dick' about all the small things. He would criticize my work day in and day out and then we had a big fight one day about him getting his act together and that was that."

"Ah, I see." Jake said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "It doesn't look like you'll be making friends any time soon."

"Not a fucking chance."

"Didn't think so. So on other topics, do you have any siblings?"

"Well, sort of. He's sort of a celebrity and he's never really been around much. I essentially raised myself. What about you?"

"No, no siblings, my grandmother raised me, and she died one day when she was out hunting; a bear got her. I was pretty young too."

"Sorry to hear that. Wait, she was hunting bears?"

"No, she was hunting moose and a bear got her."

"JESUS! Where the fuck did you live?"

"To be frank, I'm not quite certain. It was on an island somewhere. She had specific parameters set up for my safety in the event of her death and someone came and got me and brought me here."

"Wow, that's… I don't really know how to respond to that."

"Seems pretty far-fetched, huh?"

"Well, just a little. But nothing too out of the ordinary."

"Wha- Really? You don't think it's unbelievable?"

"No, not really." Dirk shrugged and chewed on his pencil.

"Well then." Jake said awkwardly, putting some aces up into their spots.

"Mhm. I'm just glad I never took Karkat up when he asked me out. The fallout from that would be ten times as worse."

"W-wait, he asked you out?" Jake sputtered in surprise.

"Yeah. He's not my type at all though." Dirk said calmly, taking his pencil out of his mouth and continuing to sketch.

"S-so… then, what is your type?" Jake tried his hardest to resist the blush that was creeping into his cheeks. He thanked the gods that Dirk wasn't looking at him.

Dirk took a deep inhale and sighed, setting his sketchbook and pencil aside and turning to face him. Knowing that Dirk was looking at his face made Jake blush harder and he didn't have the slightest idea why. "My type isn't limited to a specific set of characteristics, it's defined by personality."

Dirk smirked as he continued, watching Jake grow ever more flustered. "Buuuuuut, tall, rugged, cute, and spontaneous fits my type. Just in case you were wondering."

Jake blushed scarlet and hid behind the computer screen and buried himself in his solitaire. He was so wrapped up in the game that he didn't hear Dirk coming up beside him, leaning against the desk the computer was on beside Jake, somewhat close to him, looking up at him with a slight smoulder in his eyes, "Why do you ask?"

Jake sputtered and went redder, unable to respond for a bit. Once he had regained his composure, he blathered out "J-just curious is all."

Jake still couldn't meet his eyes, but they stayed like that for a bit, Dirk gazing at him with Jake glancing at Dirk out of the corner of his eye every so often, getting flustered once again when he noticed Dirk was still watching him.

Dirk decided after about ten seconds, which to Jake felt like an eternity, to leave the poor boy alone for now. He stood up and moved back to his sketch book, putting an extra sway in his hips that Jake tried in vain not to watch.

He didn't know why he was acting like this. He had had an inkling that he wasn't straight for some time now but had never had any proof. He had never met any women that could keep up with his adventurous nature and sweet side he had hidden beneath his punky exterior. Dirk was definitely flirting with him but Jake still wasn't sure where his own sexuality lied. He let out a small sigh and remembered the words of the song that his grandmother used to sing merrily around the house.

"Que sera, sera." He breathed out loud, the words lacking the melody they usually held when tumbling from his lips. He decided to just let whatever was going to happen, happen. Dirk was probably going to flirt with him more, so why not flirt back

The day went on and passed without any further flirting, a turn of events both to Jake's dismayal and at the same time, to his relief. Jake hadn't been too sure of how confident he would have sounded if he had tried to flirt back. Not to mention the fact that he would have had no idea what to even say. He gave a small sigh of mainly relief and grabbed his coat to leave.

"Have a good day, Jake." Dirk said as the brunette put his coat on.

"Thank you kindly, you too, dear friend!" Jake smiled warmly at him and headed out the door, which Dirk locked behind him.

Jake walked on his merry way and a few minutes in, froze and inwardly cursed himself for potentially sounding like he friendzoned Dirk.

Dirk unplugged the open sign and slumped down on the floor. He leaned his head back against the door and hit it against said door a few times. For the first time, he stopped to ask himself what the fuck he thought he was getting himself into.

Fuck, so typical of you, Strider. Don't even stop for two fucking seconds to ask yourself if this is a good idea or not. Fucking genius you are.

He sighed again and stopped beating himself up about what an idiot he was and contemplated on if he should actually become romantically involved with his new employee. Hadn't he just said earlier that he was so glad that he didn't go out with Karkat? Waiting a while and getting to know the guy would be a wiser move. Dirk decided to hold off on the flirting for a while. Besides, he really didn't want to be accidentally making the guy uncomfortable and end up with a sexual harassment charge on his back. It was better if he didn't.

Speaking of flirting, meanwhile, at the English residence, Jake was frantically looking up pick-up lines and flirting techniques. He practiced many ways to deliver it and found that his preferred method of choice was with double pistols and a wink. Golly he felt so suave doing this! He would be getting all the ladies like this! Er- well, or gentlemen as well, he supposed.

Little did Jake know that this work would be for naught, the flirts would not come his way tomorrow, nor the next. He spent many more hours practicing, researching and rehearsing. When dawn came next morning, he was ready. He hopped out of bed and eagerly prepared for the day ahead.


	3. Chapter 3

p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake waltzed into work, confident as can be. He strutted with the air of a confident peacock, as he sauntered over to the Strider, going about the increasingly more familiar tasks as per usual. He eagerly anticipated Dirk's flirtatious advances. Advances that would not come. Not today./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Someone's looking chipper." Dirk mentioned as he saw the brunette enter the store with…not a smile….was Jake smirking? He was. Dirk had only known Jake for a few days now but he did not seem like the mischievous type. Well, he supposed this was just a side to him he had not seen yet. He shrugged it off and continued to manage the shop finances on the computer. Jake pulled a sketchbook out of his bag and became enraptured in it until he finished whatever it was he was drawing./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"When he finally looked up, he seemed like he had a small epiphany. "Oh, I nearly forgot! One of my pals mentioned here or there that she was looking into getting a tattoo. She said that she had a bit of time around noon to come in today, if that would be manageable?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yeah. That's fine, practically no one comes in around lunch. We should be fine." Dirk said, not looking up from his computer./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Alright, stupendous, just thought I should check." Jake said, putting his sketchbook away and coming to stand behind Dirk, standing particularly close. Dirk could feel his face heating up as he cleared his throat and focused harder on the monitor. Jake asked as innocently as he could "What have you got there, chum?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk pushed the butterflies in his stomach down and tried to ignore them. He gathered his composure and replied in his Strider calm, "The boring part of this business."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake leaned in closer, his breath ghosting over Dirk's neck, supposedly reading the screen in order to see what was there. He let out a short scoff and leaned back a little, no longer leaning over Dirk's shoulder to see the screen. "Well doesn't that look like a rally," his voice was dripping with sarcasm. He paused for a bit, then smirked and leaned in to whisper in Dirks ear seductively, "But you know what may be a little more enticing?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk choked on his own saliva. Real fucking smooth Strider, he thought to himself, fighting a blush to the best of his abilities whilst hacking and coughing like a fucking /Jake noticed this and covered up his mouth to suppress his chuckle, finding the whole ordeal quite frankly amusing. Eventually, he reached out a hand to help him, patting him gently on the back, "Crimony, Strider! Are you alright? I could swear you were trying to hack up a lung!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk was more than grateful for the fact that Jake had expressed his concern, and in the process of doing so, given Dirk an opportunity to avoid his earlier comment. "Yeah," he said a little raspily, "I'm fine"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Well as long as you're alright, Strider." Jake said with a hint of amusement in his voice and his hand still placed between Dirk's shoulder blades. He had the most adorable, bemused expression on his face and Dirk couldn't stop staring. He was transfixed with this goddamn goofy, cute, nerdy, guy and he didn't know what he was going to do about it. Dirk could feel himself leaning in. He knew he shouldn't, but he found himself unable of stopping. Jake was leaning in too, curious what Dirk's lips would feel like on his own, and soon enough they were centimeters apart once again, breathing the same air./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk reached his hand up to caress the side of Jake's face and pull him closer when just then, the bell chimed on the door and a customer walked in. The two jumped apart. Dirk sighed both in relief and in disappointment, standing up to deal with the customer and leaving behind a blushing and flustered Jake./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I-I'm sorry about that, was I interrupting anything?" the customer asked when Dirk came up to her, a light blush adorning her cheeks in embarrassment or shame, Dirk wasn't sure which./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. "No its fine, Miss. How can I help you?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"As he took her over to the front desk to book her an appointment for next week while Jake slowly recovered, his thoughts reeling. He had been prepared for Dirk to flirt back, but not that. He ran a finger over his lips and let his mind wonder what would have happened had the woman not walked /She walked out and gave Jake a wink and mouthed 'call me' to him despite the fact that she had never given him her number, leaving Jake to be somewhat puzzled as the door swung shut behind her./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The silence fell over them and settled in to all the crevices of the room, filling it with awkward tension./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"They felt the tension like a physical weight, pressing down on them. They were doing their best to keep their eyes off of each other and failing /Every so often, their eyes would meet, and they would quickly look away, Jake blushing, and Dirk covering up his blush and suppressing the fluttering feeling in his stomach. On his face, he was deadpan, but inside he was a mix of emotions./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake was the first one to try to talk. "So, erm, I hear that the gas prices have gone up again." He offered awkwardly, attempting to relieve some of the tension./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""That sucks, but doesn't really bother me too much. I typically use my e-bike in the summer so my legs are beefed by the fall."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""How exactly do those e-bikes work, if I might ask?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Umm, there's like a battery storage and you can chose to pedal it to produce and store energy, or you can run the energy that you already made by pedalling and ride it like a moped."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""FASCINATING! That is stupendously genius!" Jake gasped, estatic./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk's gaze softened and he had to suppress a smile at Jake's enthusiasm, he was absolutely ecstatic about the brilliancy of these spunky new gadgets. Dirk wasn't really paying attention, and at a lull in Jake's prattle he cut in with "Do you wanna go for a ride on mine sometime?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jakes eyes absolutely lit up and nodded enthusiastically "BLIMEY, of course I would!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Good, I'll make sure that it's the ride of your life." Dirk said with a smirk, casually slipping in an innuendo when Jake was not expecting it. Unfortunately for Dirk, the double entendre was lost on Jake in the midst of his excitement./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Technology isn't your strong suit is it?" Dirk inquired the chipper lad./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He stopped and smiled sheepishly at Dirk, shaking his head and responding with "Heh, ah, not really. I do try to keep up to date but it is certainly not easy with how fast things are coming out."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk suppressed a snort and used every ounce of willpower to not make a joke about it. "It happens to be my area. I actually build robots in my spare time."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Once again, his eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas. He had a feeling Jake would want to see his workshop. God why the hell is Jake so goddamn adorable when he gets excited like this. Annnnd I just called him adorable. Great. So much for not crushing on him./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake saw him smiling and smiled back warmly, catching Dirk off-guard. "So, chap, do I get to see these cool spare-time robots?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk let out a chuckle, "If you want, sure. I didn't think you would be interested in that kind of stuff."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Dirk, that is absurd! Of course would be interested in that! Do you have ones that work?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""A few, if I'm not satisfied with it I'll use it for parts for a new project."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake nodded and refrained from jumping up and down like a giddy schoolgirl. His excitement was impossible to hide, however. Dirk couldn't help but let the corners of his mouth turn up. God he was just so adorable. His heart skipped a few beats and he kicked himself mentally. No Strider should be falling this hard this fast. He was a disgrace./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I feel like I need to go and cut some shit down with my katana. Or-or punch stuff or something. God, can you take care of the shop for like 5 minutes so I can go and re-masculate myself?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Erm, and why exactly do you need to go do that?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Just… I have to, you wouldn't understand."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Well, alright. Have fun with your…. Re-masculation or whatnot."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Mhm." Dirk walked up to his apartment, grabbed a sword out of the fridge and headed out back to go cut stuff./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"7 minutes later, he returned, a little out of breath and glistening slightly with a faint sheen of sweat. Jake had to say it made him look quite attractive. Jake swallowed around the lump that had formed in his throat, and looked away, trying to regain his composure and suppress the blush on his cheeks./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk didn't notice and put the blade down behind the desk, not wanting to put it upstairs./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Better now?" Jake asked, trying to get his mind off how handsome Dirk was looking and the pheromones that were pouring off of him. Not to mention the fact that the blonde looked mighty appealing with a sword./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk nodded silently. "Did any customers come in while I was gone?" Jake shook his head and continued to work on the drawing he had started in Dirk's absence./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The blonde bobbed his head in acceptance. Dirk was silent and stone-faced. He went around and disinfected everything again, even though it had already been done that morning. When that was done he checked that there were no email-in appointments, a task that took about 3 minutes, leaving him bored and highly restless./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Dirk, are you alright?" Jake said, noting his odd behaviour, looking up from his sketch to watch Dirk pace about the shop./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk pivoted around and looked at Jake, full of animal instinct and ferality. The look on Jake's face was so innocent, so pure, Dirk couldn't help but rush towards him to claim his lips in a passionate kiss. The look on Jake's face stopped him though. He looked like a frightened deer in headlights. He froze in his tracks./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"His hand was resting on Jake's face and their lips were close. Dirk stood up quickly, broken out of his reverie, and quickly walked away from Jake to go work on the computer again. Jake looked mildly crushed and downtrodden, having been so close two times in a day been so close and both times have it be taken away from him. It was plain as day that Dirk had feelings for him, so why did he keep hesitating?/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake had half a mind to march right up to Dirk and kiss him since the blonde couldn't seem to summon the balls to do it. But there was something about the scowl on his face that stopped him from doing so./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The rest of the day passed without a word between them. Jake went home and threw his coat at the wall in frustration./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"emWhat the fuck is he doing? Does he think he's playing some kind of fucking game?! Just stringing my heart along for the ride? Toying with my love as if it's- love? No, no, I don't love him, I couldn't love Strider this soon. Affections. That's a better word for it. Toying with my affections. Although, isn't that what I was planning on doing to him? No, no, flirting and toying with emotions are different. What on earth is going through his blasted head? Sometimes I wonder./em/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake tossed his keys and phone on the counter and flopped down on the sofa. He scrubbed his face with his hands, sighing. He let his hands fall down his face and he opened his eyes to look up at his bland, white ceiling./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He heard his phone buzz from the countertop upon which he so hastily put it. Jake promptly ignored it, whomever it was could wait; he was most certainly not in the mood for it right now./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He rolled over into the depths of the couch, hearing the phone buzz a few more times in the distance, before he dozed off into a peaceful sleep./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Meanwhile, the woman on the other end of the phone was quite miffed at the brunette's lack of response./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jane Crocker fumed quietly, muttering under her breath. Jake was still not answering. She huffed out a sigh and set her phone down, putting on a fake mustache to keep her spirits up, twirling the tips of it between her fingers./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She had been trying to remind him about the fact they were to hang out after he got off of work. Jane also needed advice on the fact that her friend Roxy may or may not be flirting with her. She rolled her eyes, standing up and heading into the kitchen to make some sweets and confectionery for herself for once and not the bake shop she ran./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She had no idea how to handle the situation. Roxy was a drunkard, and even though Jane did not condone her perpetual state of inebrium (a few drinks every now and then doesn't hurt), Roxy continued to drink her issues with her mother away. Jane let out a sad sigh, Roxy had been on her way to becoming a scientist, a major in ectobiology, but that all crashed down when her mother died./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jane had done her best to comfort Roxy in her time of need, and the blonde was grateful for it; however she found more comfort in the bottle, and occasionally harsher substances. Her whole career, three years in university, wasted away and now she has resorted to staying inside her house and making small money from hacking gigs and selling viruses and /At this point Jane had finished making the red velvet cupcake batter from scratch, and went to find the cupcake tray and the wrappers. As she did, her phone went off and she peered over to see who it was./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"When she saw who it was from and what the message said, she dropped the tray and fell to her knees with a hand over her mouth, her world tumbling before her./p 


	4. Chapter 4

p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk had been on his way to the store when he had received the message from Roxy. It had been panicked and surprisingly sober, albeit rushed. He had run home as fast as he could and hopped into his truck and floored it./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Roxy was in trouble. Roxy was in emdeep /emtrouble. And she was counting on Dirk to bail her out of it. At least this time it wasn't actually her fault that she was in trouble. From what Dirk could decipher from her hurried texts, there was someone after her and she may or may not get assaulted and/or raped. Dirk was, for the first time in a while, scared shitless./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He knew better than to try and call her; if she was hiding from them he could blow her cover. He frantically texted her back to call him and tell him where she was. He could only hope the sound on her phone was off./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Meanwhile, mildly intoxicated but quickly sobering up, Roxy pulled her vibrating phone out of its place in her bra. It was Dirk, and it seemed like he was asking her whereabouts. She didn't have time to stop her sprint to check. She quickly unlocked her phone and told Siri to call Dirk, setting it to speaker and sticking it back in her bra in order to glance back before hurrying up a fire escape./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"For now she couldn't see them and hoped by hitting the rooftops she could shake them. It was riskier but much faster if one was physically fit enough. From her new heightened point of view, she glanced down the alleyway she was running down and sighed in relief when she didn't see them./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Roxy?! Where are you? What the hell happened?!" Dirk's voice said from her cleavage./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Oh my god, Dirk, you are a fucking godsend. Right now I'm on the rooftops and I wanna make sure I shook them off properly, can you track me on your car's GPS from my cell signal?" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""No! Who do you think I am? Fucking CIA?! I can't do that but depending on who you pissed off, they might be able to track you the longer you're on it. Just gain some ground and get to a hotel or some shit and stay there until I can get there. Text me the address and then get rid of that phone"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""DIRK, Chill. They aren't that badass to track my ce-"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""DO IT ANYWAY. I WANT YOU TO BE SAFE."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""OK, FINE. I gotta go be parkour as fuck, be right back!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""You go girl" Dirk said encouragingly before hanging up and letting her get to it./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" Jane was busy cleaning up the mess she made when she heard the phone ring. She scrambled to go and get it, frantically pressing the button and moving the phone to her ear. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Hello? Rox?!" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""No, this is Dirk, Roxy is fine for now, I'm going to go pick her up now. I'll let you know once I get her if she's ok. She texted me your number and told me to call you." /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Ok, thank you. Um, what did you say your name was again? Dick?" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""No, emDirk /em. With an 'r'. You must be Jane."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""That would be correct." /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Nice to finally meet you. Sort of. I better focus on making sure our favorite blonde is ok."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Thank you." Jane clicked off her phone, and Dirk did likewise, tossing his phone on the driver's seat as he turned to his dash panel, trying to hone his gps on her cell signal./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He built robots, he coded, but he wasn't a hacker. Hacking was Roxy's game. Hacking and being a drunk mad scientist-y cat loving wizard./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He thought to himself how if he was straight, he would have fallen for her pretty easily. He let out a small sigh before checking the GPS. It had found her and she wasn't far. He pressed a button and got the panel to dial Roxy./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The call almost went to voicemail but she picked it up at the last second, panting. "Hi."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Got your position and I'm tailing you wherever, I'll do the same. Make sure you drop the cell on the rooftop before you go."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes, emfather /em." she chided./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk scoffed, "See you soon."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Bye, hot stuff!"/p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He continued following her position until she came to a stop, and he pulled up to the front of the building that happened to be a hotel, smirking as he imagined her knocking on some random person's 30th floor balcony window and the look on their faces as she dashed into the apartment and straight out the front door./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"A few minutes later, Roxy strolled out of the hotel and made a dash for Dirk's car. As soon as her door was shut, he pulled out and sped off, not even waiting for her to buckle up./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Did you toss the cell?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes of course I did! God, who do you take me for? I did take out the media and SIM card tho."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk rolled his eyes at her and handed her his cellphone. "Call Jane and let her know you're ok, I bet she wants to hear from you personally."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk focused on the road and zoned out of what Roxy was saying to Jane. So much for getting milk, this night had done a full 180° from what it had been. He smirked and pulled a cigarette out of a compartment in his car, sighing./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He had been meaning to get rid of all of them but he hadn't gotten to the ones in the car yet. He could not have been more thankful for small mercies. He rolled down the window and pulled out a lighter./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Upon hearing the click, Roxy's head flew around in appalled anger. She quickly told Jane she had to go and ended the call before unleashing her wrath. "I thought you were quitting, emmister /em."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I am. Hopefully this is my last one. It was by pure chance that I still had any in the car. But can you honestly blame me after tonight?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Her gaze softened as she turned to look out the front windshield once more. He heard her mumble a small "no…"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yeah. That's what I thought." He said as he took a drag and rolled down the window to blow out the smoke. He rested his elbow out the open window./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Roxy sighed and ran her hand through her hair. She put her head in her hand as she gazed out the window. A minute of silence passed and Roxy turned to look at Dirk, "You know what, you're right. Gimme your phone I need to text my dealer, I need to get high"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Roxyyyyyy…."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Can you blame me?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He sighed and rolled his eyes at his words being thrown back at him, nodding to his phone, allowing her to use it. "Fine but you better let me have some or no deal."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Of course I will."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: center;"_/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"3 grams later, Roxy dished out a good hit or two of weed into a little baggie for Dirk as he dropped her off at her place. He headed off, happy that she was safe. /p 


	5. Chapter 5

p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk woke up to sunlight glaring in on him, and winced and rolled over. He had just shut his eyes before his mind registered what it had just seen. Dirk snapped them back open to look at a shirtless, sleeping Jake English in front of him. He took a moment to admire Jake's finely sculpted chest and abs, as well as his tattoos. As shocked as he was to see it, he wanted one calm moment to admire him before he let his brain freak the fuck out. He looked longingly at Jake for little while longer before addressing the fact that not only was he himself shirtless, but also without pants. He wracked his mind for possibilities that could have lead to this that didn't include sex./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"After about ten minutes of pondering and searching desperately through his mind for any memories of last night, he deemed himself too tired to figure it out. He sighed and decided not to bother and to just try and get some more sleep. He turned back to face the sun, pulling the covers over his eyes./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The shift of the covers seemed to stirr Jake slightly and he shifted forward and wrapped his arms around Dirk, cuddling close. This made Dirk blush, but he didn't dare move Jake's arms. So he sighed and relaxed into the embrace, succumbing once more to the peaceful serenity of sleep./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake awoke with his arm around Dirk, noticing that both were shirtless and wondering what on earth had happened last night until his stomach gurgled in an ominous way to remind him what had happened./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He groaned and clutched his head as he stood, squinting angrily at the morning light, and headed over to the bathroom for some advil and what he could do of his morning rituals, given that he wasn't home and was also unprepared./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He started washing his face before noticing that his chest reeked of vomit too. After hunting down an advil in the medicine cabinet, he shed what was left of his clothes and hopped into the shower./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk awoke to a cold back and the sound of water running. He rubbed his eyes and sighed, his bladder screaming at him after all the alcohol that he consumed and he had no idea how long Jake was gonna be in the shower. He figured he might as well knock and ask if he could go to the bathroom./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"So he knocked. "Yo, Jake, I gotta take a leak, mind if I pop in? I promise I won't look, and I know better than to flush, I'm not Dave."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake had to ask him to repeat it, this time he quieted the spray with the palm of his hand to hear Dirk. He agreed to the request and continued his shower./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The door opened and Dirk came in, just wearing his boxers, and he walked to the toilet and Jake tried to avoid seeing if he could catch a glimpse, but curiosity got the best of him. It was then that he realized it was pointless anyway, due to the frosted glass divider that sectioned off the shower from the rest of the bathroom. Jake refrained from hitting his head against the wall./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk finished washing his hands and was walking out of the bathroom when he heard a small "Wait!", Dirk paused and acknowledged that Jake was heard, "I forgot to find a towel…"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The blonde chuckled and went over to the rack where the towels were kept and fetched one out, handing it to the outstretched arm poking out of the shower door. With another small chuckle, he paused at the doorway, asking, "Anything else to be of service, your highness?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake stepped out of the shower then, towel around his hips, running a hand down his face, droplets of water clinging to the hairs on the back of his neck and rolling down the planes of his well-sculpted chest./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"It sure as hell wiped the snide smirk of Dirk's face. "No thank you. But if I remember correctly, you wore most of my vomit, so you might want to hop in."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The older man just stood there dumbfounded for a second, a tad preoccupied by the sights in front of him, and then a second or two more to realize what the brunette was saying. "Huh?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I nailed you pretty good last n-no no wait that came out wrong, what I meant to say was I pretty much hurled all over you. You might want a shower."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""So emthat's /emwhy we're less than fully clothed." Dirk concluded finally, taking a step into the bathroom from his position in the doorway./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes, one of us probably put our clothes in the wash." Jake said with confidence, as the other began removing his shades, "... I hope."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""You can go check while I have a shower. If anything you can borrow some of my clothes." He replied, stripping out of his boxers, unnoticed by the younger male./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes but it isn't the clothing I worry about so much as the contents of the pocket-ssssssstripping." He finished saying as he turned to look at the Strider./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk stood in the doorway, fully undressed now and not shameful in the least about it. Jake blushed and turned around, hunting down the dryer. Dirk ran his hands through his hair and realized he had yet to take his fingerless leather gloves off. As he removed them he told Jake, "Well, the washer and dryer are downstairs if you wanna go check."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Will I be able to find the stairs easily?" Jake called after Dirk, who was returning into the bathroom with his sweet, sweet ass./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""If you can't find them, don't be afraid to open doors, not that it's behind a door, but…" the blonde called after him, shutting the bathroom door behind him./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake went to go see if he could find the stairs. Sure enough, they weren't too hard to spot. He headed down them and found a chrome metal washer and dryer set, and opened up the washer to fish out their belongings. He threw the clothes that weren't his into the dryer, finally finding his jeans. He stuck his hands into his pockets for his wallet, sighing in relief when he found that it wasn't in there and his money didn't get wrecked by the washer. He checked for his keys too, which were also missing. Good thing too, he didn't much fancy his car keys getting ruined./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He tossed the rest of the clothes over to the dryer and set it to 50 minutes, figuring it should do the trick. He headed back to Dirk's room to see if he had emerged from his en suite bathroom. He had not, so Jake continued looking for his wallet and keys./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He started with the bedside table, to no avail. That would make sense if he had taken off his pants during sex, but they didn't have sex. So it must be somewhere else in the house. Dirk had said he didn't mind Jake opening doors and poking around, right?/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He started out in the sitting room, figuring that it would be the most likely place that it would wind up. He checked all the tables; on, under, and around them, to no avail. He started looking in the other rooms./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk finished off his shower and emerged from the bathroom, toweling off. He looked up to find Jake frantically searching through the house, and it didn't look like he was looking for the dryer./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Couldn't find the stairs?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake jumped at the unexpected appearance of Dirk, slightly flustered because he was caught appearing to ransack his host's home. "N-no, actually. I found it just fine. But my keys and wallet were not inside, somewhat thankfully. At least they're safe but now I can't seem to find the buggers."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Ah, shit. Well. I'll help you look. You have some memory of last night, right?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Very little. I remember a drinking contest and calling Roxy and singing to her, and things get foggy after that. I remembered the puking after I smelt it on myself. I think I was straddling you at the time and that's why most of it was on you-"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Wait but why were you straddling me?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I believe we were making out, but I am not terribly sure."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk did his best to hide his blush. He had put his shades back on so that helped. Jake was a little dismayed, he had been hoping to catch a glimpse of Dirk's eyes./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk cleared his throat, noticing that the two of them were still in towels. "Well. I'm going to go put some clothes on. Would you like to borrow something?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake nodded and stuttered "Eh, yes, actually. Thank you."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk headed to a dresser, dropping his towel on the way, motioning for Jake to follow to pick something out. Dirk grabbed some boxers and slipped them on before fishing out the rest of his outfit./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake stood slightly behind him, waiting for him to be done. Dirk stepped away and jerked his head towards it as he started pulling his clothes on./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake looked around for some jeans, he figured he could just wear his boxers from last night. He pulled out a pair and checked the tag to see if it would fit, only to find it had been cut out./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Uh, mate, what size are you?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Shouldn't you buy me din-oh you mean clothing. Yeah I'm a medium."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake grumbled at the lack of specifics and figured it would be better to try them on. At least the shirts would most likely fit. Men's medium is a very versatile size apparently./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake grabbed a random shirt and pulled it out, setting it beside the jeans. It was the. He noticed that the blue shirt he had happened to pull out was a Rainbow Dash t-shirt. He was at a loss of what to say. He had heard of this television show before but really didn't know much about it./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He opened his mouth to ask Dirk about it but the shirt had suddenly disappeared. Dirk was over grabbing a belt. Was it a ghost?/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Dirk?" He inquired, getting a "mhm?" As a response, "Do you, by any chance, know what happened to the blue shirt I just set out? It was just here a second ago."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I was over here putting my belt on. How could I have possibly done anything?" He said, laughing as he used his slight of hand to hide the shirt quickly. Flashstepping comes in handy more than you think./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""That's true. Too bad. I was hoping to learn more about that particular program."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""R-really?" Dirk tried to say in the most nonchalant manner he could, but some of his excitement still managed to leak through./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes, actually. I've heard about it but don't know very much of it. Anyway, I suppose I'll just get another shirt."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"As he did so, Dirk made a mental note to get him into MLP later. After Jake retrieved a shirt, he went to go collect his boxers from the bathroom, putting them on in there and depositing the towel in the laundry basket./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He came back out to put the laid-out ensemble on, and he didn't notice Dirk's quick last-minute once over of his body from his doorway before disappearing into the kitchen./p  
hr style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"As Jake attempted to control his hair, wondering how on earth Dirk managed it, he caught the smell of coffee wafting through the morning? afternoon? air./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Once Jake had finished primping, he followed his nose (to the fruity taste that shows) and as he entered the kitchen, he could detect the scent of toast and eggs that were unnoticeable over the coffee before./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Are you allergic to anything?" Dirk asked, slightly shocking Jake, who had been thinking that his approach had been relatively quiet./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""U-um, no, no. Not that I know of, at least."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk seemed to ponder on that little tidbit of information a while before shrugging and assuming the brunette had tried eggs before. Considering that Jake seemed to be British and Dirk was fairly sure that Brits have eggs in a lot of traditional dishes? He shrugged and figured that Jake was not blind. Perhaps lacking his glasses for the time being, but not blind. If he had objections to what Dirk was preparing, he would probably speak up./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Um, so…" Jake started, attempting to make conversation, "have you heard from Roxy yet today?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"This made Dirk pause. With recent events, it would definitely do good to keep an eye on her. "Actually not yet, but that's a good thing to keep in mind, thank you." The blonde said as he glanced over his shoulder to make eye contact with his guest before returning to the meal at hand. "Come to think of it, I haven't actually checked my phone yet, so maybe she did get a hold of me. While I'm making this, you can go look for your stuff. I'll call when it's ready."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Ok, sounds good." It definitely beat awkwardly standing there looking at his (quite nice) back. Jake really wasn't one to endure awkwardness. So he set off to look for his belongings./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Before breakfast he managed to locate his glasses, and afterwards he and Dirk managed to hunt down his keys and wallet. Which were in the same place, thankfully./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake and Dirk were sitting on the couch, and Dirk came to the realization of something. "Wait, you said you were on my lap because we were making out?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I think so, yeah." Jake said, a little disappointed that they had (maybe) kissed and neither of them could even remember it./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake looked at his watch, seeing that it was 2pm. "Uh, shouldn't we be opening the shop?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dirk had a blank look on his face as this settled in, then let out a loud "FUCK!" and promptly bolted downstairs to quickly open up shop./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Jake followed suit, laughing slightly at the man he had come to be quite fond of in quite a short time./p 


End file.
